The BA II Plus cash-flow worksheet

The Cash Flow (CF) worksheet on the BA II Plus is the entry point for Net Present Value (NPV) and Internal Rate of Return (IRR) on any project with uneven cash flows. The keystroke path is short, but the worksheet has two features that surprise candidates on first use: it stores up to 24 cash flows in a list that does not reset on its own, and each cash-flow slot has its own frequency field that defaults to 1 and is easy to scroll past.

This page covers the screen-by-screen entry, the frequency key, the clear sequence between problems, and a worked example. Charterly's free BA II Plus calculator lets you replay the example live, and it catches a stale CF list under rule M5.

What the worksheet stores

Inside CF the worksheet exposes a list:

• CF0 is the initial outlay (period zero). Sign convention: money the candidate parts with is negative.
• C01 through C23 hold subsequent cash flows. Each has a partner field, F01 through F23, which is the frequency (count) of consecutive periods that share that value.
• NPV sits at the bottom of the same worksheet. It asks for a periodic discount rate and computes the present value of the list.
• IRR also lives at the bottom. It solves for the periodic rate that makes the list's NPV zero.

F0n is the feature that compresses a repeated cash flow. A 25-year annuity of 1,000 is one C01 = 1,000 with F01 = 25, not 25 separate entries.

The keystroke pattern

For every CF problem:

1. Press CF to open the worksheet.
2. Press 2nd then CLR WORK immediately. This wipes any leftover list.
3. Type CF0 and press ENTER. Apply the sign convention.
4. Arrow down once. Type C01 and press ENTER. Arrow down once. Type the frequency for that cash flow and press ENTER.
5. Repeat for each subsequent cash flow.
6. To compute NPV, press NPV, type the periodic discount rate, press ENTER, arrow down, press CPT.
7. To compute IRR (continuing from the same list), press IRR then CPT.

The single most common mistake on first use is forgetting the arrow-down between the value and the frequency field. The worksheet does not announce the field; it just shows whatever value is in the slot.

A worked example

Problem. A project requires a 50,000 outlay today and produces 8,000 in each of the next five years, followed by a 25,000 terminal cash flow in year 6. Compute NPV at 9 percent and IRR.

1. CF
2. 2nd then CLR WORK
3. 50000 then +/- then ENTER (CF0 = -50,000)
4. Arrow down. 8000 then ENTER (C01 = 8,000)
5. Arrow down. 5 then ENTER (F01 = 5, so C01 repeats for periods 1 through 5)
6. Arrow down. 25000 then ENTER (C02 = 25,000, lands in period 6)
7. Arrow down. (F02 stays at 1.)
8. NPV. 9 then ENTER. Arrow down. CPT.

Expected NPV: -3,976.1067.

IRR then CPT gives expected IRR: 6.7045 percent.

The clear sequence between problems

CE/C from the home screen does not clear the CF list. Neither does 2nd CLR TVM. The only clear command that works is 2nd CLR WORK while you are inside the CF worksheet. The full safe sequence for every new project is:

1. CF (open the worksheet)
2. 2nd CLR WORK (clear it)
3. Begin entering CF0

If you skip step 2, the prior project's flows are still there, your new CF0 overwrites the old CF0 but the old C01 through C23 remain, and your NPV or IRR is wrong by the leftover slots.

The frequency trap

Two failure modes around F0n:

1. F0n left at 1 when the flow repeats. You typed the value once and scrolled past the frequency field. The flow is treated as occurring once. The schedule is wrong.
2. F0n set to the count after a different cash flow. You meant F02 to be 5 but you set it on F01, so the previous cash flow now repeats five times.

Both are silent. The worksheet does not warn either way. The safest habit is to set F0n explicitly after every Cn entry, even when the value is 1, so the cursor lands on the next cash-flow slot rather than on a frequency field you might miss.

How Charterly catches this

Rule M5 fires when a drill knows its expected CF count and the actual list is longer. In free-solve mode (no drill context), M5 does not fire because there is no expected count to compare against. The companion fix is the clearing TVM page's habit: always run 2nd CLR WORK inside the CF worksheet before entering a new list.

For HP 12C candidates, the cash-flow registers (CF0, CFj, Nj) are the parallel surface. The NPV and IRR on the HP 12C page walks the same problems with HP keystrokes.

Related pages

• NPV and IRR on the BA II Plus covers four worked CFA examples on this worksheet.
• The twelve CFA calculator mistakes lists every named rule across both devices.

Frequently asked questions

How many cash flows can the CF worksheet hold? Twenty-four positions, CF0 through C23. The frequency key compresses repeated flows, so a real schedule of more than 24 periods can still fit if some flows repeat.

Can the BA II Plus skip a year (cash flow of zero)? Yes. Enter the zero explicitly with 0 then ENTER for that Cn slot. The engine treats zero as a real cash flow and advances the period count.

Does the discount rate I store in NPV need to be the annual rate or the periodic rate? The periodic rate. If the cash flows are quarterly and the question gives an annual rate, divide by 4 before pressing ENTER. If monthly, divide by 12.

Does Charterly auto-clear the CF list? The Charterly drill UI clears the engine's CF list between drills. The standalone calculator keeps your list across the session by design so you can edit it. The mistake-detection layer surfaces a warning when a drill expects a clean list and finds a stale one.